Launcher

LONDON -- Police on Thursday found part of a rocket-propelled grenade launcher near the scene of an attack on the headquarters of Britain's MI6 intelligence service, which they believe may have been the work of Irish Republican Army dissidents. No one was injured in the Wednesday night attack, and damage was limited. World News to Note

It started as a routine traffic stop but ended with Orlando officers seizing a small arsenal of powerful firearms including a 37 mm grenade launcher. Orlando police stopped Fritz Joseph, of Miami, and Delroy Blake, of Casselberry, in a white Audi as the two rolled through a red light and made a right turn without coming to a complete stop, an arrest report said. The stop happened near Pine Hills Road and North Lane about 4 p.m. Wednesday. When police asked 33-year-old Joseph for his driver's license, he said he didn't have it but 29-year-old Blake handed his over.

MADRAS, India -- India is on the verge of developing an engine that would enable it to launch high-altitude communications satellites, a top space research official said. The technology could also be used to build intercontinental-ballistic missiles. The cryogenic engine, which uses liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, would let India launch high-altitude satellites into a geosynchronous orbit that keeps them stationary relative to a fixed point on Earth.

Thirty years ago this week, the mug shots of eight people were splashed across the front page of the Orlando Sentinel, mine among them. Calling ourselves the Pershing Plowshares, we had taken part in a spectacular Easter Sunday break-in of the then-Martin Marietta Corp. plant on Sand Lake Road as part of an anti-nuclear-weapons protest. At the time, Martin - now Lockheed Martin - was manufacturing the Pershing II missile, a Cold War weapon system that many believed represented a dangerous escalation of the nuclear-arms race.

A 51-year-old woman was arrested after officials searched her home and discovered four rocket launchers, a rocket warhead, a missile launcher and materials to make explosives. Trudy Sherburne was arrested Friday for investigation of possession of a destructive device, possession of a deadly weapon and child endangerment, San Bernardino County sheriff's officials said Saturday. Investigators were searching for Christopher Sherburne, 54, who is thought to be her husband.

JERSEY CITY, N.J. -- An old anti-tank-missile launcher was found Friday on a lawn in Jersey City, just across the river from lower Manhattan. The launcher was inoperable and posed no hazard, police said. They turned it over to Army officials at Fort Monmouth. Army personnel identified the yard-long tube as an AT-4 anti-tank-missile launcher, said fort spokesman Timothy Rider. Such launchers can be used only once to fire a missile. Soldiers determined this launcher had been fired, he said.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. planes bombed a ballistic-missile launcher in southern Iraq on Tuesday, Pentagon officials said, in the first operation against Iraqi weapons that are meant to hit ground targets instead of aircraft or ships. Eight U.S. planes dropped a total of 16 bombs on the missile system near Basra about 11 a.m.

Police closed a two-block area of Orange Blossom Trail Sunday after someone discovered a loaded military rocket launcher.Bomb squads eventually took the weapon to a vacant field near the Citrus Bowl and destroyed it.Ernest Eugene Jones, 36, address unknown, told Orlando police he found the weapon in a bag early Sunday near Spring Lake Drive and the railroad tracks. Jones carried the weapon to Jefferson Street and the Trail, where he was stopped at about 7:30 a.m. by an officer inquiring about the bag.The officer alerted the Orlando Fire Department's bomb squad, and the Army Bomb Disposal Unit at Patrick Air Force Base also was notified, police spokeswoman Sgt. Joni Gauntlett said.

ALLIEDSIGNAL INC. said Thursday it was awarded a $500 million contract to build an advanced navigation unit for the U.S. Army's mobile rocket launcher. The company said the navigation unit will provide directions for maneuvering the launcher and aiming instructions for firing its rockets. AlliedSignal said its division, Guidance & Control Inc., based in Teterboro, N.J., will develop the units.

Early Thursday morning, a giant crane behind Kennedy Space Center's landmark Vehicle Assembly Building slowly hoisted a steel cage and set it down on top of nine others, completing a 355-foot tall launch tower for NASA's new Ares I rocket. Two workers then hauled a potted kumquat tree to the top for the traditional "topping off" ceremony. It was literally the crowning achievement of a $500 million project at the heart of KSC's efforts to prepare for NASA's Constellation moon program.

France-based Arianespace, the world's leading satellite-launching service provider, is eyeing the growth of demand in Asia , particular in telecommunications and earth-observation satellites. The increasing popularity of telecommunications, satellite TV, high-definition digital broadcasting and mobile internet has led to the need for more satellite capacity in the region. "Asia is the new frontier for Arianespace. This part of the world sees the most significant growth.

A $2,000 pair of pocket pistols and a military rocket launcher -- sans rocket -- were among the 1,673 firearms that Los Angeles residents traded in for gift cards in the city's gun buyback this weekend. Los Angeles police Chief Charlie Beck and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa showed off an array of handguns, rifles, shotguns, rifles and assault weapons collected at six locations and piled before them Monday at a news conference outside the Los Angeles Police Department Administration Building.

An Orlando man who was operating a marijuana grow house and was caught with a grenade launcher and machine gun was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison Thursday, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Daniel Martinez, 29, was found guilty in August of manufacturing marijuana and several weapons charges. Orlando police found marijuana growing in Martinez's house in September 2010. The drugs have a street value of more than $90,000. They also found a loaded fully automatic machine gun, a loaded handgun with extra loaded magazines, and a grenade launcher.

A heavily armed Orlando man caught running a big-money marijuana operation last year was convicted on drug and firearm charges on Wednesday, officials said. When authorities raided the Gaston Foster Road home of 29-year-old Daniel Martinez in September, they said they found a marijuana growing operation, a fully automatic machine gun and a grenade launcher. The case was investigated by Orlando police and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Officials estimated the street value of the marijuana at $90,000.

A new high-tech training contract for Cubic Corp.'s Orlando-based Simulation Systems Division has set off a modest burst of hiring by the defense contractor. Cubic Simulation recently landed a $26 million deal to produce advanced field-training simulators for the Javelin portable anti-tank system made by Lockheed Martin Corp. and Raytheon Co. The company plans to fill 14 immediate openings for program engineers, technicians and other support staff. An unspecified number of other hires are expected during the next six months.

CAPE CANAVERAL -- Early Thursday morning, a giant crane behind Kennedy Space Center's landmark Vehicle Assembly Building slowly hoisted a steel cage and set it down on top of nine others, completing a 355-foot-tall launch tower for NASA's new Ares I rocket. Two workers then hauled a potted kumquat tree to the top for the traditional "topping off" ceremony. It was literally the crowning achievement of a $500million project at the heart of KSC's efforts to prepare for NASA's Constellation moon program.

NEW DELHI, India -- The first test flight of a satellite launcher meant to catapult India into the club of space powers was aborted Wednesday when one of its engines appeared to catch fire while on the launch pad. Flames could be seen enveloping one of the rocket's four Russian-made engines.

They stand off in space like giant and malevolent peashooters -- spitting messengers of death at Soviet missiles arcing toward American targets.Like a machine gun, they spew out projectiles that would maybe look like hockey pucks, hurling them toward enemy missiles or warheads at velocities of perhaps 20 miles a second.Moving 15 miles a second faster than chemical rockets, they destroy their targets by sheer velocity, striking with the force of several times their weight of TNT.They aren't propelled by an explosive charge or by chemical fuel.

Early Thursday morning, a giant crane behind Kennedy Space Center's landmark Vehicle Assembly Building slowly hoisted a steel cage and set it down on top of nine others, completing a 355-foot tall launch tower for NASA's new Ares I rocket. Two workers then hauled a potted kumquat tree to the top for the traditional "topping off" ceremony. It was literally the crowning achievement of a $500 million project at the heart of KSC's efforts to prepare for NASA's Constellation moon program.

BEIT HANOUN, Gaza Strip -- Three young Palestinian cousins were killed Wednesday in northern Gaza in what the Israeli army said was an attack on rocket launchers aimed at southern Israel. The incident could set back peace efforts, just a day after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert met in Jerusalem to try to move the process ahead. The Israeli army said it spotted figures handling rocket launchers and attacked them from the ground. Witnesses confirmed there were rocket launchers in the area.